Yugoslav War Crimes Trial To Begin Artukovic Was Croatian Officer

ZAGREB, YUGOSLAVIA — An 86-year-old man charged with killing thousands of Jews, Serbs and gypsies in World War II goes on trial Monday in what likely will be one of the last great war crimes trials.

Andrija Artukovic, extradited from the United States Feb. 12, faces a maximum penalty of death.

The minimum is five years in jail.

Prosecutors have charged Artukovic with mass murders and atrocities from 1941 to 1945, when he was police minister in the Nazi puppet state of Croatia.

Zagreb is the capital of Croatia, which also was the site of the Jasenovac concentration camp.

Some 700,000 people died in Jasenovac. Witnesses against Artukovic will include survivors of the camp.

Radoslav Artukovic, 37, who lives in Los Angeles, hired three Yugoslav lawyers to defend his father.

He has been given a visa and may attend the trial.

Artukovic fled Yugoslavia in May 1945 and reached the United States by way of Ireland.

Yugoslavia had sought his extradition since 1951 when the Belgrade government learned of his whereabouts.

Artukovic, himself a lawyer, stalled extradition by arguing in U.S. courts that he would not be granted a fair trial in communist Yugoslavia.

Zagreb public prosecutor Ivanka Pintar-Gajer filed an indictment March 14 charging Artukovic with genocide and war crimes against civilians and prisoners of war.

When he was brought to Zagreb in February, Artukovic was taken to a specially arranged hospital prison room.

Yugoslav doctors examined him to see if he was fit to stand trial and pronounced his health satisfactory.

Yugoslav officials interrogated Artukovic for about three hours a day from Feb. 28 to March 6. Defense attorneys attended each session.

Artukovic denied all charges during the interrogation and accused the U.S. administration of ``shameful and illegal extradition,`` court sources said.

He told interrogators he had done big favors to the American people in fighting communism.

Artukovic opposes what he calls the ``artificial creation`` of multi- national Yugoslavia.

Prosecutors allege he was an ideologist of the Ustashi movement of extreme Croatian separatists.

Authorities have built a bullet-proof glass screen to protect Artukovic during the trial, expected to last until April 30.

Chief judge Milko Gajski, president of the Zagreb district court, will preside over a ``council`` of four members besides himself. The five, including one judge and three jurors, will pronounce both the verdict and sentence.

The trial will be open to the public, but there are only 175 seats in Zagreb district court`s biggest courtroom.

Court officials said the 130-odd Yugoslav and 60 foreign journlists will cover the trial on closed-circuit television in an adjoining courtroom.